


Intoxicated

by peaceloveandjocularity, stateofintegrity



Category: MASH (TV)
Genre: Charles can't drink, I finally found a color for Charles' eyes, M/M, Mentions of past abuse, linguistic lows and swearing
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-09-22
Updated: 2020-09-22
Packaged: 2021-03-08 00:14:57
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 8,289
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26596633
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/peaceloveandjocularity/pseuds/peaceloveandjocularity, https://archiveofourown.org/users/stateofintegrity/pseuds/stateofintegrity
Summary: Charles can't seem to make his feelings known without drinking first. Max doesn't approve.
Relationships: Maxwell Klinger/Charles Emerson Winchester III
Kudos: 7





	Intoxicated

Surgeons saved lives. Many lives. Klinger had seen four hundred and thirty-two young men pass through OR in the course of a week, and almost all of them made it to post op. For this reason, he didn’t mind the job of escorting exhausted doctors back to their quarters, basically slinging their long arms over his smaller frame. Even heroes needed a little help sometimes. Nor did he mind performing this same service when said surgeons blew off steam by going on a bender. Sure, the alcohol fumes had a way of melting the hair in his nose, but Klinger could handle it.

What he struggled to handle, these days, were those times when Charles Emerson Winchester III cut loose. It wasn’t that the Major was damnably tall - though he was! - or difficult to corral — it was that  _ he wouldn’t shut up. _

This wasn’t exactly surprising. Winchester was loquacious when he wasn’t liberally lubricated with cognac, and he liked to hear himself talk. Klinger couldn’t have named his accent, but he liked the sound of it and was usually content to let Charles hold forth, saying things like, “Is that so?” and “How interesting,” to keep him going. As a result, he knew more about concertos than he’d ever wanted to and he was familiar with the submission processes for the country’s most elite medical journals. If Charles had just stuck to either of those topics, all would be well.

Unfortunately, Winchester’s latest theme was proving particularly painful to the plucky Corporal in the yellow scarf and cocktail dress. And he had no idea how to make him be quiet.

It had started innocently enough. One night when Klinger was helping Charles back from Rosie’s bar, the Major had chanced to ask why Klinger rated a solo tent when virtually everyone else (minus the CO, the head nurse and the chaplain) had to endure cramped quarters.

“Fringe benefit of being crazy, sir,” Klinger had explained. “No red blooded American soldier wants to share a tent with a guy in a dress.”

“I too-took it, that is, I understood the dresses to be a dodge.” The words were broken up by hiccoughs.

“They are, indeed, sir,” Klinger assured him (insincerely but it wasn’t as though Charles was going to remember one way or another), “but no one wants to take a chance. Besides, what with the size of the Klinger collection, there really isn’t room for anyone else, so it works out.”

Charles stopped dead in the middle of the road, almost wrenching Klinger’s arm out of socket, and looked him over.

“Major, what is it? It’s late. C’mon, we need to get back.”

“I merely wanted to conf-confirm what I thought. Klinger, you really are not very tall.”

Klinger didn’t know whether to laugh or scream. “Found our limit tonight and went right past it, didn’t we, Major?”

Charles ignored this; even drunk, he could be touchy about his dignity.

“I am trying to say that your won’t-be tentmates must suffer from some defect to their vision. We used to 4-F such people. “

Klinger just wanted to go to bed. “I don’t follow, Major.”

Charles waved an arm, an erratic gesture that said  _ how can you not _ ? “You are much too small, man, too fine-featured, to be going about molesting anyone. I mean, look how delicate.” His hands formed a hoop around his waist; the fingers nearly touched.

One thing Klinger had not been prepared to miss while in the army was the feel of another’s touch. It surprised him that he  _ could  _ miss it, dealing as he was with fear, the wounded, bad food, disease, bugs and snakes, and all the terrible sounds that attended clashing armies. But the Lebanese Corporal had grown up in a large and affectionate family; he was accustomed to having his hair tousled, his shoulder squeezed, and, among taller relatives, being bodily swept off the floor. That his contact drought would end like this, that his touch-starved nerve ends would come blinking awake under Winchester’s fingers... it was a most unwelcome jolt.

Reaching down, he pried those long digits away from the fabric. “Come on, Major. Time to go to bed.”

Charles blinked for a moment, seemingly confused. Then he looked Klinger full in the face with eyes that seemed darker than usual. “Was that an offer, Max?” he didn’t sound drunk at all now.

Warning sirens bleated in Klinger’s brain, not least because a new warmth living in his body told him that he’d liked having Winchester’s hands on him a little more than he should. “My job description stops at escorting, Major.”

Charles looked worn at that, maybe a little sad. “Pity. I wouldn’t have remembered a thing the next morning.” So saying, he let himself be led.

***

The next time came after BJ threw Hawkeye a “Congratulations - you’re not in Leavenworth!” party following Pierce’s insane escapades at the peace talks. To lift Hawk’s war-weary spirits, they’d dyed their green army gear (the official color was called moldy spam, they were certain of it) red. They even dyed the hair of everyone in camp! Vats of red punch kept everyone laughing and, after hearing Hawkeye recount his adventure, saying, “Howdy!”

The punch hit Winchester with both fists; he actually praised Pierce! “Careful, Charles,” Hawkeye had teased. “You’ll hate yourself tomorrow.”

“Oh, I already do,” Winchester assured him, staggering off to find a place to sit. Gravity and the punch were conspiring.

A few hours later, Hawkeye signaled Klinger to work his magic and to put the surgeon back in his bunk. Klinger sighed but snapped to. And Charles was, at least, happy to see him, smiling radiantly at his appearance. “Max! Where have you been hiding yourself? I didn’t get to dance with you,” he waved a single finger for emphasis, “not even  _ once _ !”

“That is a tragedy, Major,” said the Corporal, getting him on his feet and out the mess tent door.

What proved far more difficult than getting Charles to the Swamp was getting loose. When the Major crashed into his bunk, Klinger was borne down with him, crushed into his side - very much the little spoon. Unfortunately, his temper was as hot and whistling as a neglected tea kettle. “Major! You’re heavy! Get off!”

Instead of obliging, Charles’ fingers made a sort of cage around his elbow. Klinger squirmed futilely. “What are you doing?”

“You have a bea-bee-beautiful elbow, Corporal. I am caressing it because it, like so much elsh of you, has been neglected.”

Klinger groaned, dismayed. It probably wouldn’t help to explain that what Charles was actually doing was poking him - annoyingly - and keeping him from getting up and leaving. Gritting his teeth, he decided to wait for the Major to fall asleep. But each time he thought Charles had drifted off, those fingers would tap at him again.

“I really did want to dance with you, Max,” Winchester said at last.

Klinger smiled ruefully and wondered how he always got in these fixes. “Next time, Major.”

“Everyone was drinking. No one would have minded.”

“I know, I know. And you wouldn’t have remembered.”

Winchester was snoring softly now; Klinger extricated himself as gently as he could (it wasn’t a short process) and walked into the dark.

***

Then came the un-wedding. 

Tormenting Winchester about the trip to Tokyo that he didn’t remember had kept Klinger entertained, almost to the point that he could ignore how much it hurt to think of the Major married. His dance with the (un)bride was the hardest part. Her eyes widened on hearing his name and she broke into a smile. “Maxwell, huh? I’ve heard so much about you!” It made him imagine their lives after the war. Charles would marry then, for real, and Klinger doubted he’d ever speak his name again, even to reminisce. He didn’t expect more, precisely, but it still hurt. 

And, honestly, rather it was right or not, Max held Charles to a higher standard. That he could cut loose and drink enough to get himself in this wedding fix (those pictures had  _ really  _ been rough to look at, making his eyes sting, even if developing them had won him a few minutes of friendship from the Captains) … it disappointed the young Corporal that looked up to him. If it made him wish, too, that he’d been in Tokyo for Charles to see (he had way better dresses than Miss Parker), well, nobody needed to know that part.

When Winchester stumbled out of his own un-wedding and Hawkeye signalled Klinger to follow, the Corporal wanted to scream. Couldn’t someone else babysit for a change? The entire night had served as one big reminder that the one person capable of conjuring feelings in him in the whole country (maybe the whole world, for all he knew) was very much out of reach. Didn’t he deserve to sit and nurse his drink and try not to imagine what Charles had gotten up to with his not-quite lady love? Grumbling, he walked into the night, resigned to being unofficially assigned to making sure Winchester didn’t break his valuable neck. 

Engaged in uncharacteristic self-pity, Klinger forgot just how long the surgeon’s legs were. He had to hurry to catch up to the wandering inebriate, a feat made more challenging by Charles’ tendency to zig and zag toward his destination rather than going in a straight line. Every time Klinger thought he knew their destination, Winchester made an abrupt turn, leading him on a merry chase across the compound until they were at the side of the creek. 

_ No no no no no _ , Klinger thought as his quarry neared the edge. He wasn’t tall enough to manhandle Winchester if he decided to indulge in a midnight swim - and Potter wouldn’t appreciate it if he let one of his surgeons drown in five inches of water. Thankfully, Charles didn’t  _ enter _ the stream. He just knelt down beside it and trailed his hands in the moon-sparkled current before swiping damp fingers over his flushed face. 

Klinger joined him at the edge of the water. He shook his head at the man. “Drinking’s what got you in trouble in the first place, Major. Maybe you should give it a rest for a day or two?”

“Maxwell!”

Klinger groaned softly to himself. He could tell just by looking that Charles’ vision had to be fuzzy, fragmented. Damned if his enthusiasm wasn’t kind of endearing, though. 

“I’m glad you came to celebrate my nupsh-nuptials. Un-nuptials.”

The word stung like the alcohol prep for an injection. “I take it you’re A-ok with being a bachelor again, Major?”

“Very much so.”

The gambler in Klinger would have bet that Winchester was too drunk to narrow the space between them so effectively. But somehow he did - he was practically graceful about it - and now they were facing each other, sitting on the cold ground in Korea. Some part of Klinger probably knew what was going to happen next. He gasped anyway, that gasp turning to a moan - half desire, half reprimand - as Charles kissed him hard enough to knock him over. 

It was so intense of a kiss that Klinger temporarily lost the ability to focus on anything else; he had no idea what his body was doing below the lips. Winchester didn’t have that problem, however. One hand rubbed the back of Klinger’s neck, angling his head for better access. The other unbuttoned his pants.

It hurt Klinger to evade that touch, but he knew he had to. “No, Major.”

“No?” It wasn’t a word Charles wasn’t accustomed to hearing on a regular day, given his money and status. And drunk as he was, he knew what he’d felt. 

“No. Get up now, sir. I’ll help you back to the Swamp.”

“I will do no such thing. We are quite alone here. I want you.”

It was more than Klinger could bear. “Do you realize how much it hurts to know you feel the same as me but only when you’re real drunk? Tell it to me sober, Major, or don’t say it at all.”

The surgeon blinked; felt the cold ground for the first time… except that, somehow, he felt it  _ inside _ . “I hurt you?”

“Everything I said and  _ that’s _ what you’re focusing on?”

“I’m a good surgeon, Max. It is the sole thing for which I have ever been valued. What will it all mean if I’ve begun to hurt people?”

Oh. So it was his reputation he was worried about. “Don’t compare me to your patients, Major. I’m not one of them.” 

Charles looked him over, head to toe, taking in everything. “Perhaps if you would allow yourself to be, you would feel better.” 

“I don’t think they make the gloves for that, sir. You only touch me when you’re drunk and I don’t think they let surgeons operate that way. Damn you, Charles! I’ve never met anyone so shut off from their own feelings.”

It struck him; even drunk it changed his eyes. "I have told you repeatedly how I feel.  _ You  _ are the one who always wriggles away. Do you not understand how much I am offering you?"

Klinger was in no mood to hear about Winchester wealth and prestige. “You only tell me  _ after _ a bottle. Tell me tomorrow when all you’ve had is shitty mess coffee and I’ll think about believing you.”

"I  _ will _ tell you tomorrow, but I can make you believe it  _ right now. _ ”

Klinger fought back tears born of frustration. “I won’t be able to  _ look _ at you tomorrow knowing I’ve taken advantage of you, Major, let alone listen to you.”

“It has never stopped anyone else,” Charles said with surprising lucidity, thinking of the bottles lined up in a Tokyo hotel room. “Why should it give you pause?”

“Because I  _ care _ about you, you idiot!”

"And yet a woman who didn't was happy enough to kiss me - to pretend to take my hand in marriage! - all I have ever gotten from you is your contempt.”

“It’s not contempt! It’s basic human decency to not take advantage of someone! I can’t stand the  _ thought _ that you’d sober up and regret this, Major. I’d rather die.”

He couldn’t understand  _ why _ Klinger was so upset but the severity of his feelings registered. “You… you want me sober?”

“Yeah, it’d be a nice change. It might not be the worst thing for  _ you _ either!” 

“Fine.” He stood at last. “Would it be too much of a strain for you to lead me in the direction of coffee?”

“If it wouldn’t be too much of an imposition to ask you to keep your hands to yourself.”

“Imposition is a nice word, Max.”

“You didn’t fall for me just for my looks, right?”

Sober, Winchester could have assured him that he’d fallen for everything about him. Drunk, his mind was on something else. “You said it would be ‘taking advantage.’ I’m a grown man, Max. Don’t you think I can handle my own?”

“I’m not yours to handle, sir, and, no. I think if I let go you’d be in a hell of a fix.”

“But you could  _ be _ mine if you would stop fighting me so!”

“Until tomorrow when you divorce me?” he snapped. 

“I would sooner die than divorce you. Provided I could marry you in the first place.”

The Corporal groaned; now Charles was just parroting him. Maybe humor, little as he felt like indulging in the stuff, would set things to rights. “Listen, Major, if you think you’re going to propose to me so lamely, think again. I’m a classy broad.”

“You had me on my knees already and you insisted on finding coffee!”

“I want you on one knee for the proposal and two knees after, thanks.”

It perked the Major up. “Put some thought into this, did you not?”

“I’ve put no thought into anything ever. Oh look, home sweet home.” And the lanterns were burning, which meant Winchester could be someone else’s problem. Half-dragging him through the door, he sloughed him onto the cot and glared at the other two doctors. “Can I have one day where I don’t have to haul someone’s drunk ass back here, please?”

Hawkeye gaped. “I thought you liked his ass?”

“To fuck, sir, not to carry. Goodnight.”

At the Corporal’s departure there were two very red faces and Winchester, facedown on the cot, giving a wobbly thumbs up. 

BJ and Hawkeye stared at each other, exchanging a did-you-hear-that look. They stood together and went to stand on either side of their inebriated bunkmate. 

“Charles? Care to comment on this evening’s entertainment?” 

The bleary-eyed surgeon cracked one bleary eye. “ ‘m supposed to be enjoying coffee by now.” He frowned. “As it seems I will not be enjoying anything else.” BJ motioned to Hawk. If coffee was the key to getting to the heart of Klinger’s crude and unexpected outburst, they were more than happy to play the part of serving girls. 

They got the mug into Winchester’s (albeit shaky) hands and got him to sit up. Now their goal was to get the whole story… and maybe tease the man - just a little. 

“You’re cutting quite the swathe, lately, Chaz,” said Hunnicut. “First a marriage you don’t remember and now a proposition Hawk and I will never forget!” 

Charles shrugged, a tiny smile rising on his lips, crooked and helpless. “It seems… that is, it has been suggested, that I, uh… that Bacchus may not be the specific deity most concerned with my, ah, well-being.” 

Hawkeye pressed a hand to his head.  _ He  _ hadn’t drunk enough to be sporting a headache, but when Charles meandered off into the world of classical allusions, it made him long for a translator. He looked to his best friend. “It’s really late. Could you put that into English, please?” 

“I sch-speak perfect English,” Charles protested. “As well as a handful of romance languages and Latin.”

“Forgive me,” Hawk said, but did not mean. “Beej?”

“What Charles means is that he can’t hold onto his liquor - or, it seems, his dates. What did you do to Klinger, Charles? I’ve never seen him like that.” 

His patrician brow furrowed as he either strove to remember or fought back a serious wave of regret. The coffee had kicked in some, because the words were clearer. “I hurt him, I believe. Rather badly at that. Worse, I do not believe this was either the first or the only time.” 

Hawkeye shot BJ a worried look. They antagonized Charles, sure, but they valued him, too. Had he done something bad enough to jeopardize their friendship? 

“What did you do, Charles?” Hawkeye asked. “Specifically?” 

Charles rested his head in his hands. “It seems that,”

Hawkeye cut him off. “No. No ‘seeming.’ No deflecting. What did you  _ do _ ?” 

“I expressed my feelings to the Corporal.”

“We didn’t know you had feelings for him,” said BJ.

“Or for anyone else,” Hawkeye added. 

Charles looked miserable. “It is hardly the sort of thing one discusses.” He stood and refreshed his coffee. The memory of Klinger’s pained eyes had found him and while he knew that coffee would not drown it, he hoped it might take the chill from him. Klinger’s voice had been so very cold! “Especially in the army.”

Hawkeye looked upset. “Look, Charles, I know we’ve left snakes in your bed and eaten your food. We’ve recorded inappropriate postscripts to your letters and hidden your socks. But you can’t have thought, not even for a minute, that we’d hurt you like  _ that _ \- or let anyone else hurt you either!”

Charles shrugged at this. “It is… it is a delicate thing. A shameful thing, if you ask most people.”

“We’re your friends, stupid!”

It rang so close to what Klinger had said:  _ I care about you, you idiot _ . Perhaps it was true. Perhaps he had been a fool - twice over, even. “And  _ that  _ is a rather unfamiliar state for me as well.” 

BJ nodded as something he’d suspected was confirmed; he’d long thought that Charles was the loneliest creature he’d ever seen. “Well, get used to it. You’re stuck with us. Now finish what you were saying about Klinger. You told him how you felt and?”

“He refuses to believe me.” He sighed. “He says I only tell him when I have, ah,”

“Drunk enough to fill a sumo wrestler’s bathtub?” Hawkeye offered. 

“Something like,” Winchester agreed. He rubbed the back of his neck; pain was beginning to settle in his head and shoulders. “The trouble is this, gentlemen - the Corporal is quite right.” 

BJ was thinking back over the night’s festivities. He thought of Klinger patting Charles on the back as he became “the unwedded” Dr. Winchester.  _ That must have hurt _ , he thought,  _ especially coming on the heels of your divorce _ . 

“It’s a pattern for you, though, right?” asked Hawkeye. “That’s how you got married, after all.”

“Please do not remind me. It was thinking about this mess … about him… that got me into  _ that  _ mess.” 

Pierce’s eyes twinkled. “Are you telling me that all we had to do to avoid this whole thing was to send Klinger with you to Tokyo?” 

“I do not know. I am apparently incapable of making my devotions to the man without first being inebriated and the Corporal is, by his own admission, not one to take advantage - though I have asked him to do so several times in very plain language.”

“Ten bucks say you didn’t say ‘fuck,’ though,” said Pierce, unable to resist.

Charles glared. “A Winchester would never stoop to such linguistic lows, thank you. What I can say is that if I had learned that I had married Corporal Klinger - drunk or not - I would not have raced to engage the services of the reverend JB Honeydew. Does that satisfy you?” 

BJ performed his duties as translator once more. “You’re in love with him.”

“Yes. So I have been saying. To you, tonight. To him, apparently, on several soused occasions.” He sighed. “He is, rightly, quite furious with me.” 

“I don’t know,” said Pierce. “I think you might still have a horse in the race.” 

Charles groaned. “You do not understand, Pierce. Tonight I managed to improve upon my past transgressions. I… I kissed him.” He knew he’d done  _ slightly  _ more than that, but he wasn’t ready to face it yet. “Even drunk, there is no excuse for my behavior.”

BJ disagreed. “Love makes everyone stupid, Charles.” 

“Stupid, perhaps, but not a cad. Were I in Klinger’s, ah, heels, I would not forgive me.” 

BJ smiled. “Good news, Charles. You had the good sense to fall in love with someone with a far sweeter disposition than your own.”

“He’s right,” Hawkeye agreed. “Apologize and mean it and he’ll let you off the hook.”

Charles just looked weary. “I longed to be ‘off the hook’ of my imaginary marriage, but better I had married in truth- and folly - than hurt him.” 

“You can fix it,” Hawkeye assured him. “But do it in the morning when you can think straight and you’ve cleaned up a bit.” 

Charles accepted this only because he knew Klinger didn’t want to see him anymore tonight. But as he lay in his cot remembering his less than gentle trespasses, he feared that his tentmates - his newly declared friends - were wrong. 

***

There was, Charles Emerson Winchester III knew, no  _ good  _ time for men to be shot. He also knew that the wounded they received were only a fraction of the story; on the line, there would be body bags heavy with boys who never saw the 4077th. But that morning he ardently wished there could have been a delay, or, better still, a ceasefire - something to allow him to catch his breath before surgery demanded more than his best and before he had to call on Klinger for help with so much wrong between them. 

Though Winchester had known Klinger was capable of a near-perfect professionalism when he put his mind to it, his admiration increased that morning. He knew Klinger was as tired as he was, but he appeared when called, was unfailingly cheery, and fetched everything from light bulbs to litters quickly, effectively, and without complaint. “Good lad,” he heard Potter praise the man, and he longed to add something, to pat his back - but he’d stolen too many touches as it was. 

Their “shift” began at 7 AM and terminated at 11:54 - time enough to get lunch and a nap before seeing to the other duties of the day. Winchester knew Klinger would skip the food; he didn’t easily endure the sight of mangled bodies, even after all this time. He waited in the scrub room, exhausted, and saw Klinger start when he entered. 

“Major.”

“Klinger…” 

The Corporal heard enough in his tone to hold up a hand. “It’s not necessary, sir.”

“What is not necessary?”

“Whatever you’re waiting here to say. You’re tired, sir. You should go eat and get some sleep.”

“But I am sorry, Klinger.”

If the Corporal had been waiting on any words, had wanted anything from him, Charles saw that it wasn’t these. His face didn’t fall, but something in him deflated. “Yeah. I know, sir.” Then he shook it off. “You’d better go eat. And I have to get this stuff to the laundry before the next shift.” 

When Winchester didn’t move, Klinger  _ did  _ \- taking the hamper onto his hip and moving toward the door. Charles caught the hem of his skirt. “Please, Maxwell,”

Klinger twitched the fabric from his grasp. “It’s fine, Major. It’s not like it’s the first time. Apology accepted.” Then he headed out the door. 

Charles sank down on the wooden bench and removed the soft cap from his head; he crushed it in his hands and cried. 

***

Charles didn’t report his success, such as it was, to the other Swamp-dwellers, but he didn’t have to. They knew Klinger. They were certain the Corporal wouldn’t hold a grudge; he hadn’t even done so when his wife cheated on him with his best friend. But they also knew that all wasn’t well between the Lebanese Corporal and the refined Major. Charles was too pale and too pained; he moved and looked like he’d been stabbed and had somehow forgotten to remove the blade. They asked if they could help, but even if Charles had unbent toward them, he was still proud enough to want to handle this himself. 

Klinger had basically called him a coward, using 80 proof courage to say just how he felt. It was true enough and his honor demanded that he correct the flaw. He had little hope of winning Klinger over, but he owed him the words - said sans a chaser this time. Once the camp was quiet again, he went to Klinger’s tent… and stopped short when he realized what he was hearing coming from within. 

He hesitated. Klinger deserved his privacy. He’d robbed him of so much already - he should leave him this.  _ But _ , he thought,  _ I was not made to listen to your tears and do nothing _ . He entered without knocking (he’d done worse previously) and Klinger whirled at the sound, tears standing in his dark eyes. Without a word, Charles went to him and caught one of those tears on his fingertip. It flashed and sparkled like a diamond. Klinger’s voice was hoarse when he said, “Don’t,” but he was strong enough to push him away. 

Charles granted him the space he’d fought for, but looked on him with tender, beseeching eyes. “Max…” 

“What do you want, Major?” 

“To talk to you. You granted me forgiveness. Hear me out.”

“There’s nothing to say.” 

“There is if I am the cause of your tears.”

“You’re not.”

“You forget that I have played poker with you. Even without the tiara and rhinestone sunglasses, you are bluffing. Please, Max. You can throw me out afterwards, but please let me say this.” 

“Major, what’s the use? I’ve been listening to you for weeks.” He surprised Charles when he sobbed. “I’ve got the way you say my name m-memorized. Hearing it in my head hurts plenty, thanks.” 

_ And seeing you cry hurts  _ **_me_ ** _.  _ Knowing of no other way to reach past this veil of tears, the sparkle on his cheeks, his long lashes weighted with water, he got down on one knee. “Please, Max.”  _ Tell me how to reach you _ . “I never meant to hurt you. I swear it.” 

“But you do. You do every damn time. So get up. Please, go.” 

He came closer on his knees, put his pleading hands on the Corporal’s knees. “Will you at least believe that I’ve never been on my knees over anyone before?”

Klinger pried one of his hands up (it took both of his hands to do so). “You don’t know that for sure, Major. You proposed to Miss Parker.”

“I did and I am sorry. But I only drank myself into so reckless and forgetful a state because I could not cease thinking of  _ you _ .” 

Klinger just shook his head. “It’s a pretty thought, Major, but I don’t think so.”

Winchester’s hands rested on either side of his thighs; he wanted to bury his head in his lap. “I called from Tokyo. Late. Radar can tell you.” 

“More drunken promises, Major?” 

“They would have been,” he admitted. “But do you not understand? I drank because I have never felt like this before. I am not a brave man. If I was, I would not be in this war as a draftee and I would not be on my knees atoning for cowardice. But I am sober, now, Max. I swear it. And… and I love you.” 

A strange sound rattled the Corporal’s throat, a laugh and a sob at once. “Look, Major. You said you were sorry. I forgave you. You can go back to your life. You can stop feeling guilty. You can find someone you actually want to marry.”  _ Somebody that fits in your world.  _ “Somebody… somebody you don’t have to get drunk to touch.” 

“Do you not understand that I  _ can’t  _ ? There are only two people in the world whose hearts I wish to protect. That I have failed so spectacularly to care for yours is my greatest regret.”

“You’ll get over it.”

Something shattered under the dome of those impossibly lilac eyes. “I assure that I shall not.” He stood. “But I will not trouble you further, Corporal. Goodnight.” 

He departed with the feel of Klinger’s tears on his fingers. Once past the doorway, his shoulders shook and he did nothing to fend off the tears that rose in him. 

He entered the Swamp without registering anything, falling face down into his bunk. This would have been enough on its own to set alarm bells ringing in the minds of the two captains playing quadruple cranko on a foot locker, but then they saw the telltale motion of the sobs that Winchester so valiantly fought into silence. Just as silent was the conversation BJ then had with his best friend through facial expressions alone, but a translation might have read something like this:

Hawk: Charles doesn’t cry. It’s one of those old money, stiff upper lip things.

BJ: Twenty bucks says he’s not the sole casualty. Who do you want? 

Hawk: I don’t think Charles can handle comfort from me right now. He’ll think it’s pity. 

BJ: Got it. Give my best to Klinger. 

Hawkeye downed his drink and left. BJ went to the side of Charles’ cot. If the suffering form had belonged to Hawkeye or Peg or even a patient, he would have known exactly what to do. With Winchester, it was harder to know; one wrong step and he might punch through all that brittleness…  _ Hell with it _ , he decided.  _ He’s human and he’s hurting. If nothing else, it might shock him enough to make him stop crying.  _ So reasoning, the lithe surgeon wrapped himself around the shaking form of Charles Emerson Winchester III. 

In the letter he would later write to Peg, BJ would declare his conviction that Winchester should sue his family for emotional neglect. Not only did the man radiate shame at having been discovered to possess emotions, the slight measure of human comfort BJ offered made him freeze like a tiny animal snatched up in human hands. Every single muscle went so taut that they almost vibrated with tension.  _ This is abuse _ , BJ thought,  _ or the results of it anyway. It’s like he’s been physically locked away. Starved of human contact. Is that why you became a surgeon, Charles? To fix the broken parts of other bodies because absolutely no one has ever tried to mend you?  _

“I understand,” he wanted to tell him. “I know why you had to get drunk to touch Klinger.” Instead, he just held tight, shoring Charles up as tears tore channels in his formerly impervious walls. 

At last, he stilled. “You don’t have to do this, Hunnicut.”

BJ laughed at him. “You don’t know it, but I will remember the way you say my last name forever. You make it sound noble somehow. But I’m not noble, Charles, and I’m not going anywhere.” 

“But really, it isn’t necessary. You don’t have to.”

“What if I want to?” 

It made Charles turn to face him. BJ couldn’t help but wonder when Charles had been so close to someone else; sadly, he suspected it had been awhile. Now to get him to trust him. “Charles, don’t you think Hawk has leaned on me before? Don’t you think I’ve leaned on him? Friends, remember?” When he touched the back of his neck, pulled him against him, Charles didn’t fight him. 

“I’ve never let anyone close but my sister, Hunnicutt. I don’t think I know how.”

“Don’t worry. I do. And I thought you were trying to expand your circle anyway. At least as far as a certain Corporal is concerned.”

It brought everything back and Charles looked so  _ stricken _ that BJ wished he could take it back. “I take it that said attempts are at something of a standstill?” 

“You have a gift for understatement, Hunnicutt. If the Corporal and I are at ‘something of a standstill’ then the Second World War was a slight international scuffle.” 

***

Hawkeye knocked on Klinger’s door and walked right in, not even thinking to wait for an answer. “So, what kinda battle did you just go through? Because Charles is over in his tent looking like he was just on the front lines and I can see you’re not much better.”

Without answering, Klinger rummaged in his desk drawer. 

"What are you doing?" asked Hawk.

"Finding a screwdriver to remove this door. No one knocks around here anyway."

Hawkeye walked over and set his hand on Klinger’s, stopping his search. “Come on, let’s talk.” 

“How about no? This isn’t your problem, it’s not your fight. Why don’t you find someone else’s business to butt into?”

“Winchester is sobbing in the Swamp, you’re in here, holding back tears. My friends are hurting, so, yeah, it is my business. And I’m going to stay here until it’s sorted.” Hawk threw himself down on Klinger’s bed. “Feel free to start talking any time, but know I’m not above sleeping with you to get you to talk.”

The last words seemed to hit the slighter man like a blow. "You know, sir, my life was a hell of a lot easier when  _ nobody _ wanted to sleep with me, so why don't I just give you the cot,  _ I _ can leave and everybody goes on about their night?"

“Alright, so we can admit that you and Charles are each others’ problem. Keep going.” Klinger kept digging in the desk drawer. "You really are serious about that door."

"Nope, but stabbing you with a screwdriver will be less bloody than going on with this, sir."

Hawk motioned to his chest. “My heart is right here. If you want it to hurt and make me suffer though, my stomach is your better bet. So, what did Charles say?” 

Klinger’s hand closed around the screwdriver handle. It was shaking in his fist. “Why does it matter? I’ve never mattered to anyone else before, Hawkeye. Why now?”

"Is it just  _ now _ ? Klinger if this is a new thing, you're taking it awful hard. You sure there isn't some history here?"

“Hawk, please just leave me alone. Let me sleep and I’ll be fine in the morning.” 

“See? Now I know you’re not fine and you’ve admitted you’re not fine and we can move on to  _ what happened _ .” 

Klinger groaned. "Nothing. Everything. Winchester  _ happened _ \- sort of. I can forge the Colonel's signature really good now. Think I can whip up some forms and send him back?"

“What could he have  _ possibly _ said that would set you off? Beej and I were under the impression he was coming over to apologize to you.” 

“Oh, he did. And he told me he loves me. I’m not smart, Hawk, but I’m not stupid.” 

“So what’s wrong?! Isn’t that what you wanted? Him to be honest while sober?”

"Honest - sure. But who do you think's walking out of this thing in one piece? He's rich and connected and he'll be fine. And I won't. So I'm not." Klinger dropped the screwdriver to his work table with a sigh. "I'm not the kinda guy people keep around, Hawk. I got a wife and a best friend that made that real clear. And the Major, he deserves someone with wealth and social status. I've got neither."

"Maybe it's not about what he deserves, but what he wants. Isn't that more important?"

Klinger rolled his dark eyes. "You think he  _ knows _ !? He didn't even know he got married!"

"Klinger, he's remembered more of that night each day that passes. That's not a fair excuse anymore. This is less about him and more about you being scared, isn't it?"

"The war scares me, Hawk. But before he got here, I knew what could kill me. Grenades. Bullets. Shells. I don't need anything else on that list. I'd rather die sad and alone than to be broken up with again, Hawk. Surely you of all people can understand that. He's not gonna take me home to Boston and I can't be just Korea.”

"Did you ask? Klinger, I'm hardly in Charles' fan club and you know it, but I don't think he wants you as a distraction or something to do. And god knows, if you get a promise out of him, he'll keep it. We've all seen that."

Klinger traced the pattern on one of his bolts of fabric. "You think?" 

"You've heard him say a Winchester never backs out on his word before. What do you think?" Klinger looked up at Hawk, who was staring earnestly back at him. “And, Klinger? For what it’s worth, I think this is a promise he really wants to make. I think that whole Tokyo wedding farce was meant for you. I know it’s not flattering, but he wanted you beside him when the bartender said, ‘dearly beloved.’”

_ Damn.  _

“Unless you don’t love him anymore?” 

"Think you can go get him for me?"

***

Hawkeye happily went to retrieve Charles and found him asleep and BJ trapped. He shook the man’s shoulder. “Think you can come up with a proposal real quick?” He asked "Or should I take it from this interesting arrangement that we've changed our mind?" 

BJ glared at him, silently communicating the thought  _ He’s clingier than  _ **_you_ ** ! 

“Proposal?” Charles trembled. “Pierce, what are you talking about?” 

Pierce explained. 

Charles was sitting up now, blinking. “He thinks  _ what _ ?” 

BJ chimed in - not to be cruel, but to help him see. “You can see why he might think you’re out of his league.” 

“Maxwell imagines the alcohol is some sort of  _ shield _ ? A way to talk myself into doing what I might otherwise fail to do? I may be a coward, gentlemen, but a coward who knows his own heart for all that.”

BJ waved his fingers to interrupt this speech. “Miss Parker.”

“Who, by her own admission, discounted our ‘wedding’ from the first because she could ascertain how very in love I was with someone else!” 

But his friends held the course, reminding him of the times his insults (usually bandied back or ignored by the Corporal) had been, however unintentionally, crafted to  _ hurt _ . Charles shrank before their eyes, defeated by the realization that not only had he hurt the Corporal with his drunken declarations, he’d done worse sober, debasing him for his lack of wealth, his lack of education, his heritage… He felt like throwing up… or maybe walking briskly toward the other side’s guard posts. “I… it seems I have a lot to make up for.” 

“Yeah,” Hawk agreed. “But you’re missing the point. Don’t you get how lucky you are, Charles? Yeah, you messed up. A bunch. And that sweet kid loves you  _ anyway.  _ Do you know how incredible you must be to be that much of an ass and still win him? So, go be whatever it is he sees in you. He’ll help.” 

Charles went. 

He went without his dress uniform or a velvet box. All he had to offer was the wreck of himself and the love he couldn’t stop feeling, poor as the actual demonstration of it had been. He knocked at the door to Maxwell’s tent and flinched when dark, untrusting eyes met his. 

“Pierce suggested that you might see your way clear, my darling girl, to giving me a second chance.” 

His use of feminine address did not go unnoticed, but Max refused to let him see the effect. “Second?” he asked in an arch tone Charles was certain the Corporal had learned from him. 

“Seventy-fourth? Given your history of escape attempts, I rather thought you might spot me a point for persistence.” 

Klinger cracked something akin to a smile. “Not when you  _ persistently  _ break my heart, Major. The pieces are pretty little at this point, so I can’t take a whole lot more.”

“Ah, but I am a brilliant thoracic surgeon. Perhaps if you would permit me to restore what I have so foolishly and thoughtlessly shattered?” 

Klinger still looked wary, but he nodded. “One more chance.” 

Charles very carefully unbuttoned the shirt he wore and pressed his lips to the place just above his beating heart. At his nearness, Klinger felt the broken places in his heart ache as they remembered how they had reached their current state. Klinger put two fingers under his head, tipped his chin. “Did you… did you go to bed with that woman?”

“You are referring to Miss Parker?”

“Yeah.”

“No. Apparently that road was blocked while we were dancing. Women, it seems, do not like it when you close your eyes and murmur, ‘Oh, Max,’ into their hair. Though, truth be told, even drunk I knew that the stitches in her off the rack dress were far too crude to pass as yours, so I could not have long sustained the fantasy I, wrongly, attempted to create.” 

Max smiled a real smile at that. “You really shoulda known better. No one sews like me.”

“There is no one like you, my beloved, and though I have been careless and cruel with you in the past and though you’ve no reason to trust me, I love and will protect all facets of you - all of the many ways you wish to dress and to be. I will… I will delight in calling you whatever you wish.”

“‘My dear girl,’ huh?”

“If it pleases you. My pretty Corporal.” He dropped his eyes and hoped. 

“You’ll let me dress how I want?”

“How could I presume to instruct you? You dress beautifully in masculine and feminine attire. If you wish… if you would, ah, enjoy it, you may even instruct me.”

His eyes lit up at the possibility of tailoring the Major’s clothing. Poor food and physical activity had caused him to lose weight in Korea. “Things would’ve gone a lot better with us if you’d led with this stuff.” 

“And kept out of a bottle? I know. I… I have never felt what I feel for you before. It scared me, Max. It is no excuse, but…”

“I know it’s dangerous. Two guys. Even here. Nobody we care about’s gonna give us grief, but we’ll have to be careful about patients, anybody passing through. All you had to do was  _ tell me _ you were scared. I’ve been here awhile. And I was in dresses before I left. I would’ve helped.”

Charles quietly, happily marked the verb tense. “There is much I need to make up for. In my fear, I’ve said terrible things to you,” 

Max held up a hand to hush him. “I knew you didn’t mean it. You’re my best friend.”

_ Your best friend with permission, pretty pet, to kiss you until you moan?  _

“I could almost  _ hear _ that,” Klinger teased him for the look that came to his face. “Yeah, alright. I’ll trust you. But if you hurt me again you should know that  _ I _ know about air embolisms, sir.”

Charles shuddered, but not at the threat of death by hypodermic. “Darling, do not call me ‘sir.’ You only do that when you want rid of me. I know that you are still frightened. I know - and hate - that I am the cause. But I will not push you. Having your forgiveness… it is more than enough and more than I deserve.” 

“You’re good at saying sweet things, you know that? You should do it more often. And there are things  _ I  _ deserve, too, Major. The first time I got that you might be interested in me, you put your hands around my waist. Here’s the thing, before that, the only way anybody touched me around here was an army physical - or to hurt me.”

“You have been  _ harmed  _ here!?”

“Told ya I knew it was dangerous, right? Don’t worry - it’s been awhile. And with a big strong fella like you on my arm, I bet it doesn’t happen again.” He could see that Charles was getting fired up to go into crusader mode. “That’s not the part I want you to pay attention to right now.” 

“No one will ever hurt you again,” Charles vowed - and it sounded so good that it made Max shiver; he’d forgotten that Charles had that whole I-am-a-master-of-all-I-survey thing going on. “But it is the touching, rather, that you miss? 

“Bingo. Aren’t you surgeons supposed ta have good hands?” 

“Maxwell, I typically abbore surgical demonstrations in this place, but if you would please trouble yourself to lay down, I will be delighted to show you exactly just how good my hands can be.” 

“Not so fast. This is the wrong outfit. You sit - I’ll change.” 

Charles smiled; Max would not be him(and her)self without the costumes. But his fingers shook as he waited for the Corporal to re-emerge from behind a decorative screen. 

“The color is called ‘spindrift,’” he announced upon reappearing. “It reminds me of your eyes.” 

The length of the dress allowed Charles, for his part, to admire the strength in his thighs, his calves. The obi-inspired, wide, layered ribbon around his waist… black on cream… Charles had other feelings toward it besides admiration. “You did all this in  _ three minutes _ ? Your hair is curled!”

“Finger crimped it.”

“Teach me to do it?”

“Being sweet again? Told you that you were good at it, Major baby.” He stood before him with a smile that made Charles smile too; the expression felt almost more foreign than their surroundings. Fingers anchored in that ribbon, he drew Max in and lifted him into his lap. “Do you know what ‘spindrift’ refers to, dear girl?”

“Nope.”

“The spray blown from the crests of the waves. You can almost feel the tide in the walls of my bedroom at home. I was born in sound of the sea. It is very flattering that you chose an oceanic color in my name.” What he also thought, but did not say, that night was: _ I believe we could dye white roses this color for your wedding bouquet.  _ Then he remembered Pierce’s words. “Darling, I do not wish to displace you, but there is something I should like to ask if you can stand to hear it.”

Max put a hand over his lips. “You can ask me, but don’t do it ‘cause the Captain said you should, or because you’re afraid you’ll mess up and lose me. I’m gonna be way harder to get rid of than anybody you picked up in Tokyo.”

“Because you love me, Maxwell?

“Yeah, Major.”

“That seems a fine place to start. Difficult as it may seem to believe, I have never ceased to love you and I think that if you will so honor me by joining your life to mine, I shall require no further or other intoxicants than your presence.” 

“Still wish you had just started with that before you started in on drinking,” Max said, but his voice was gentle, happy. “But I’m still yours if you want me.”

***

Late that night, Hawkeye Pierce and BJ Hunnicutt took a walk to talk under the stars. And if they peeked in just to ensure themselves that everything had worked itself out, well, wasn’t that the right thing for friends to do? As they made sure the tent door fitted itself, noiselessly, to the frame, Hawk smiled to think of Max with his screwdriver… and looked forward to offering Charles a toast on his new fortune (a toast with a one drink minimum).

End! 

  
  
  
  



End file.
